The former US VP Dick Cheney, who died at the age of 84, was considered one of the most powerful holders of the vice-presidency in the nation's history. While countless VPs were confined to minor or symbolic functions, Cheney wielded substantial influence during the administration of George W Bush, to the point that he was often called as the "actual president".
Bush resented that description and stated the connection was more complicated. He noted that Cheney was courteous, consistently calling him in public as Mr President, while he referred to him as Dick. Bush disputed even characterisations of their relationship as a team because it implied that they were on equal footing. Regardless of such protestations, Cheney considered the relaxed president accommodating on a whole raft of administrative determinations.
The Post-9/11 Era
In charge of a contingent of neo-conservatives that featured defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Pentagon second-in-command Paul Wolfowitz, he strongly advocated the invasion of Iraq in 2003 in reaction to the terrorist strikes on New York and Washington. During of the 9/11 strike, Bush had been taking part in a meeting at a educational institution in Florida. While Bush made his way to a underground facility in Nebraska, Cheney took command, commanding the destruction of any unidentified aircraft heading toward the Capitol building.
Cheney said the assaults transformed him, making him become determined on retribution. Together with other neo-conservatives, like Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, he campaigned for a takeover of Afghanistan in an endeavor to apprehend Osama bin Laden. Cheney then vigorously pushed for the armed intervention of Iraq, though there was no evidence of Saddam Hussein playing a role.
Disputed Decisions
He expressed no regrets about the military campaign, in which an reckoned 100,000 Iraqis perished, nor about the waterboarding of suspects apprehended after 9/11. He informed CNN in 2015 that the Iraq invasion effort, which was based on inaccurate information echoed by Cheney, was the proper course of action. "It proved to be the proper decision to do at that time. I had faith at the time and I hold that view today."
But even then, there were dissenting voices at a senior level about the poor management of Iraq. One of the government's own special envoys to the area, General Anthony Zinni (2001-03), was dismissed from the role. "I observed, at the very least," he subsequently stated "true dereliction, carelessness, and recklessness: in the worst case, lying, unfitness, and graft."
Additional Factors
Cheney was not entirely responsible for the Iraq invasion. Prior to 9/11, Wolfowitz had advocated for similar measures. He had composed a document outlining situations in which US concerns might be endangered (including "availability of essential resources, mainly Persian Gulf oil"). Wolfowitz had argued that "the US should be postured to operate alone when joint efforts cannot be arranged," specifically mentioning armed actions against Iraq.
Bush additionally had entered the Oval Office generally inclined on implementing what his predecessor had notably declined to do in 1991; remove Saddam. Subsequent to he had been dismissed by the administration, the finance chief Paul O'Neill revealed how, at the opening session of the National Security Council in January 2001, Bush had announced his plan of diminishing America's engagement in the regional tensions and mooted armed intervention against Iraq.
Bush bore a individual resentment against Saddam, thinking he had been behind a plot to kill his father, President George HW Bush, on a journey to Kuwait in 1993. He furthermore disliked that one of the most prominent establishments in Baghdad had a surface artwork with a image of his parent's visage that all visitors had to tread upon.
Questioning Techniques
But it was Cheney who was one of the most outspoken supporting attacking Iraq, repeatedly citing information documents that were either weak or completely misleading. He endorsed what the Bush White House indirectly described as "enhanced interrogation", the employment of waterboarding and physical pressure.
Responding to a Senate report in 2014 that determined that no useful information had come from the torture, Cheney disregarded the conclusions as "loaded with crap". He stated to Fox News: "We instructed [the CIA] to implement measures and establish programmes to apprehend the perpetrators who took the lives of 3,000 of us on 9/11 and ensure it never happened again. That is precisely what they did and they deserve a lot of credit."
Public Persona
Cheney took pleasure in labels assigned to him by opponents such as the dark character and the sinister presence, and by the concept that he was a shadow power directing Bush. In Peter Baker's 2013 book about the pair, Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House, Cheney is reported as stating: "Am I the malevolent mastermind in the shadows that operates invisibly come out of his hole? It's a nice way to function, truthfully."
Corporate Connections
Controversy over his business interests followed him during his tenure as vice-president. Although he had limited background in corporate affairs but established relationships in security, especially in Saudi Arabia, he was asked to become part of Halliburton, one of the world's most substantial oil and gas companies, in 1995 as chair and chief executive.
In 2000 he assumed the role of Bush's VP candidate for the executive branch. Controversially, during the Iraq war, Halliburton was granted US contracts worth multiple billions.
It made him rich. His yearly earnings during his period at the company rose from his quarter-million dollars when he was military head to over four million. When he left in 2000 he had a severance arrangement worth over $20m|twenty
